A known automated manual transmission (AMT), which includes a manual transmission as a basic component and is shifted by an actuator, is disclosed in JP2000-337494A, hereinafter referred to as Reference 1. The AMT disclosed in Reference 1 disengages a clutch before an operation for establishing a neutral state in a gear shift process to decrease a load in a rotational direction to zero at a portion where an idler gear and a shaft are fitted and then operates an actuator to release the idler gear from a state of being fitted to the shaft.
As described above, the AMT disclosed in Reference 1 disengages the clutch to establish the neutral state. As a result, a shift time becomes longer by a length of time for bringing the clutch into a disengaged state.
A need thus exists for a vehicle drive system, which is not susceptible to the drawbacks mentioned above.